Making it Harder to Complain

During Gatwick’s trial flight path of February 2014 Gatwick was inundated by complaints, for every plane that followed the route, over new areas not flown over before, residents in their hundreds were emailing Gatwick for every flight that destroyed their usual tranquility. The trial, ADNID, finished in August 2014 but left concentrated flight paths (PRNAV introduced by Gatwick in May 2014) in its wake that had been introduced on every departure route without seemingly any consultation.

Gatwick’s reaction to this onslaught of complaints was to change policy to only record one complaint per day per household, no matter how many planes flew over people’s homes destroying their quality of life during Gatwick’s peak summer season which continues today.

Since the Arrival Review of 2015/16, which the Chairman of Gatwick was forced to undertake due to noise complaints from the east and west, Gatwick have this month introduced a new complaint system via CASPER, a Netherlands based company that controls Gatwick’s flight path monitoring system.

“This new system discriminates against anyone that does not have access to a computer such as the elderly or blind by removing the phone line. Gatwick detail that residents without access to the Gatwick website will have to write a letter of complaint,” said Sally Pavey Chair of CAGNE, Communities Against Gatwick Noise and Emissions which was formed out of the trail route.

“This new system was intended to enable a true record of complaints but instead it would seem to be not only discriminating against a large section of the southeast population but also making it harder for residents to complain about noise events as each complaint has to be logged via the Gatwick website process, these two factors makes it very unsatisfactory.”

“We are still very concerned that the trial route will return now that Gatwick has lost out on a second runway and that our voices will not be heard over the continuing concentration of departures and arrivals that residents suffer due to Gatwick Airport.”

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About Us

CAGNE is a group that represents (or ‘acts for’) communities east and west of Gatwick airport that are, or might be, negatively affected by aircraft noise and would be impacted by the negative social, economic and environmental impact on the area of a possible Second Runway.

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Established in 2014, CAGNE shares flight path and airspace change information with all affected groups, and has a proven track record of challenging Gatwick’s intended detrimental actions and achieving positive outcomes.